All Things All at Once
by Stephane Richer
Summary: in those days we were kings


All Things All At Once

Disclaimer: Don't own Fujimaki Tadatoshi's _Kuroko no Basuke_ or Tired Pony's "All Things All at Once"

Author's Note: Tried to capture the essence of these characters, wasn't really sure I did.

* * *

Eikichi runs a finger around the rim of his coffee cup. This one will get broken soon enough, if it's not already. Makoto likes breaking them, likes the annoyed crease between Eikichi's eyebrows, the way he sighs and grumbles about money even though they're not wanting (a guy like Makoto will never want for money; he's too smart to be unable to support himself. On the other hand, he loves the thrill of the risk, steals Eikichi's money and hides it god knows where, maybe he invests it or plays it all away at the pachinko parlor and Eikichi doesn't care that much because they always have coffee and no one bothers them about the rent and Eikichi can never get enough food anyway) and Makoto likes it when Eikichi's had enough of his shit because he's tired of finding shards of glass buried in the tender skin on the underside of his feet, tired of being unable to walk or run hardly at all, and then they have rough sex all night and Eikichi can't feel his knees in the morning because he's been unable to balance on his feet and then Makoto will run his long nails down one leg and it Eikichi will yell a primal scream because he can feel it, how tender and broken the skin gets and how Makoto's suckered him into this twisted spiral all over again.

And then Makoto will lay out some scheme (always adding some snide remarks about how Eikichi would never think of this and how he can't really begin to fathom the true meaning, probably more snide remarks than Eikichi realizes because Makoto's so sly and fits ten meanings minimum into the simplest words) and Eikichi can't help but almost marvel at how much Makoto's actually going to fuck over the world.

Well, he won't do it himself. He'll cut a hole in the gasoline pipe, watch it spread over everything, and wait patiently for someone to toss a lit match in the wrong direction. The destruction is beautiful, mesmerizing. Eikichi has to stop eating sometimes when Makoto is telling him the stories of the destruction he's caused, and all of it's believeable because Makoto is capable of anything and everything, and the way he twists words around and around is like distorted music to Eikichi's ears, and the way he tells stories makes them sound so real that Eikichi might believe him if he said that Eikichi was a unicorn and Makoto was talking through one-way glass that went the other way so he couldn't see or hear Eikichi. (Eikichi would smash that glass, it being his turn to break and wreck the structures of their lives and because he needs Makoto to see him.)

And Makoto sees him, and Makoto touches him and possesses him, clawing at Eikichi's back and biting him harshly (never deep enough to leave a mark the next morning). The only thing Eikichi takes with him as a reminder is the pain, there is never any evidence.

Makoto doesn't like cold hard evidence. He does not like marks, proofs, throws out all of his receipts, drops them in the streets or folds them into paper cranes and takes out a lighter and watches them turn to smoke and ash on the tip of his fingers (he never gets burned, must have figured out a way to become fireproof and decided to keep the secret all to himself). He leaves a ghost trail, one of things not seen, of pain and memories and mystery that leaves Eikichi, and everyone else, grasping at straws. Did he and Makoto really do that? Did they really go there? Did they really play against one another in basketball? Did Eikichi ever play basketball at all? He wonders if he's just an amnesiac who made up a cool, semi-plausible past for himself out of people's assumptions (he's tall; he must play basketball. He's got muscles, so he must be dumb. He must need to eat a lot of protein.) who needed something to hold onto, something to believe in, to hoist himself up with.

He wonders, so he makes his own proof, proof that he is strong enough to leave a mark and more than a hazy memory. He travels to Osaka for work and buys a mug that says "Osaka" on it and brings it home. He drinks his coffee from it the first morning back and comes home as Makoto holds it in his hand, between two fingertips gingerly, and drops it on the lineoleum. Eikichi goes to Disneyland and buys a Mickey Mouse mug and Makoto smashes that one against the counter, chipping the granite. It becomes a game, Eikichi holding the evidence and Makoto smashing it all to smithereens. Makoto does not want to remember, to have concrete evidence of the past. Everything is transient for him.

"You cannot be permanent, my sweetheart," he croons, singing in a high cold voice into Eikichi's ear and then chomping on the lobe.

Makoto can destroy Eikichi, has brought him halfway down, but for whatever reason has decided he wants him to stay like this, wants to keep him here, slightly useful somehow. He's like one of those sociopath kids who cuts off the cat's tail in increments but pats the cat on the head after the tail is all gone, satisfied with whatever he believes his mission to be.

Makoto tells him he's disgusting, that there's no way anyone should be able to eat that many steak fries (two extra larges is just a snack) and that he shouldn't go out and sweat so much like a horse and that he shouldn't be so heedless and he shouldn't be so lewd (what a fucking hypocrite) and the contempt in his voice is real. And Eikichi wants to push his buttons and fuck with him in some way or other, because the mug thing isn't pushing his buttons really—it's all a game, a game that will end in a stalemate because it will never end, because Makoto will let it end that way. He wants to see Eikichi struggle and fail, to make him think he's about to succeed or go neck in neck when in reality he's just a fish out of water gasping for air. Eikichi's known people like this all his life, has seen Makoto for what he is since their first meeting, had immediately recognized it (and had still sworn to cut him down, because Eikichi was stronger, was always the strongest). Eikichi's not especially smart or observant, just in the right situation.

If anything about this could be called right.

They're shadows of their former selves, Eikichi not basking in glory, untouched by rays of light; Makoto not snatching glory so quickly from others' clutches. It is gradual, their descent. Eikichi cannot disentangle himself from Makoto now; he was too busy holding his head up high to notice Makoto working slightly below him, building the web around him feet-first and now he can only cling to Makoto, that sadistic smirk of his. This is what Makoto has wanted all along, isn't it?

Eikichi can't question it, doesn't really care to figure out why. All that matters is that it's happening, each mug with a different feel, a different radius and a different degree of smoothness against Eikichi's palm as the hot coffee burns him through the porcelain, a different angle for his hands to remember—he's always been good with muscle memory, especially with his hands—moving food to his mouth or an orange ball into a hoop, and his memories never fade. His hands flex and contort into the Osaka mug, the Disneyland mug, the Yomiuri Giants mug, the Shimane mug, the Chiba mug, the Narita Airport mug, the commemorative mug from the 20th anniversary of the sushi bar across the street, and he can trace their rims, the right circumference, the same way he can palm a basketball or press a hand against Makoto's chest, force him down against the mattress and almost suffocate him.

He knows Makoto knows he won't push all the way.


End file.
